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The Scranton/Wilkes-Barre metro area unemployment rate tumbled in April four tenths of a percentage point to a seasonally-adjusted 7.3 percent, the lowest in five years.

Data released Wednesday by the state Department Labor & Industry offered a mixed bag, however. While the rate is the lowest since December 2008 and has plunged eight tenths of a percentage point since the beginning of the year, it remains the highest among the state’s 14 metropolitan areas, a distinction the region would like to shake. Also, the predominant reason for the drop isn’t more jobs — seasonally-adjusted employment is up just 100 from a year ago. Rather, those working or hoping to work, the labor force, are fewer, declining by 5,700, reducing the labor force by more than two percent, influencing the jobless numbers.

The drop in the unemployment rate left observers such as Timothy Kearney, Ph.D., assistant professor of business at Misericordia University, unimpressed. He called the economy stagnant.

“Jobs didn’t increase — the labor force dropped,” he said. “The best case scenario is that it’s people aging out of the workforce. The worse case is that people are giving up looking for work.”

In April, county jobless numbers dropped by about 2 percentage points during the year with Lackawanna County at 6.7 percent, Luzerne County at 7.2, and Wyoming at 7.1, all down by at least two points from a year ago. The state rate in April was 5.7 percent, the national rate was 6.4 percent.

Establishment data, a count of the number of jobs in the metro area, is also grim, showing 2,800 fewer jobs than a year ago, with declines of 1,000 in retail trade, 2,500 in professional and business services, 600 in government.

Some bright spots: a 900-worker gain for the year in mining, logging and construction and 800 more jobs in transportation, warehousing, and utilities.

Given the illusory economic benefit of this recent drop in unemployment, Dr. Kearney hopes for something counter intuitive — an increase in the unemployment rate, usually a signal that an economy turns the corner. People sense the opportunity to get a good a job and come off the sidelines to join the labor force, causing a brief uptick in the unemployment rate as job creation catches up with the addition workers.

The opposite of what is happening now.

Contact the writer: dfalchek@timesshamrock.com

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